Reflections on the Modern World and the Call to Holiness

Let us take a moment to survey the contemporary world and see if we can get our heads and hearts into an active engagement with the witness of the Christian faith under these circumstances. At the heart of many of the current debates between the Church and the world (social policy, ethics and science, etc) there lies the tension of the pursuit of the good and the evil that "must" be done. We all seem to desire good living in this world, but we must ask what does this mean, and what are its implications? Over the last 500 years, we have been ever so gradually indoctrinated into a worldview in which we are at war with nature--ever so constantly fighting for our right for survival in such a hostile and unforgiving place. And our response? Science and technology will save us--we have everything we need to secure our estate in this world, just forget about religion and work for the utopia that lies at our fingertips.

At this point, perhaps we should ask if we can really save ourselves, and what does it really mean to be saved? At the depth of the human person, Fulton Sheen wrote that our deepest needs and desires are for infinite truth, infinite love, and infinite life. Can we, mere men, ever satisfy our noble longings with such weak and innocuous "treatments" as perpetual entertainment and glorified selfishness? Can we ever hope to conquer death with our own power, knowing that we will die before that is accomplished?

Just consider, perhaps the world isn't so hostile and unforgiving as we might think. Perhaps death really isn't the greatest evil in the world--maybe it is a necessary part of our growth. And ultimately, might this wonderful universe of which we are privileged to be a part have a generous and benevolent creator who has entered into the drama our our existence to illuminate our condition and fulfill our deepest needs and desires?

Here is a bold proposition to all who are wondering about the deepest meaning of your existence. Consider the drama of the Incarnation of Jesus as God speaking to you in a beautiful mystery that answers those deepest longings: the yearning for truth, because Jesus has taken the greatest mystery, that of suffering and death, into himself and revealed the Resurrection; the yearning for love, because only a heart of unimaginable depth and benevolence could ever love tax collectors and prostitutes, and forgive his own executioners; the yearning for life, because once freed of the fears and insecurities surrounding the necessary event of our own death, we can truly live in the freedom of love. Take the risk of faith, and follow your wildest hopes and dreams into the ultimate reality they bespeak!